Venables by the numbers

by David Hood - Senior Writer - Fri Mar 23 10:29:46 GMT-04:00 2012

CLEMSON – The hiring of defensive coordinator Brent Venables in January has created an optimistic buzz, a cautious yet hopeful optimism that actually surrounds the entire Clemson program this spring.

Clemson is a football program that has always prided itself on defense, but last season’s run of games in which opposing offenses ran up and down the field at will left a sour taste in the mouths of most Clemson fans, a sour taste that was even further exacerbated by an embarrassing showing in the Orange Bowl.

Clemson head coach Dabo SwinneyDabo Swinney

Head Coach

View Full Profile went out and got his man in Venables, an enthusiastic teacher of the game who had a proven track record at Oklahoma, all while playing in a conference with some of the most explosive offenses in the nation.

Venables has been, at least to date, as good as advertised. His energy rivals and maybe even surpasses that of offensive coordinator Chad Morris, and it has been good to see him actually physically walk his players through assignments and plays. During one practice, I actually saw him grab one of the young linebackers and take him through the steps of a play.

Of course, the proof of how much an impact Venables will make won't be known until the Tigers line up against another school, but the early reviews have been good.

When Venables was hired, I went out and looked to see if there was a way to statistically compare coordinators – wins and losses isn’t really enough, not like with a head coach. I grew up with a baseball background, so I’m a numbers guy, so I figured that someone had come up with a statistical analysis that could rate coordinators.

I found it at www.coachesbythenumbers.com. I like their formula because it takes into account scoring defense, total defense, third down efficiency, turnovers gained, tackles for loss per game and sacks per game. In other words – is your team getting to the quarterback, creating turnovers and keeping the opponent out of the end zone.

You can customize the ranking for just one year or the past decade, so I started with the past decade and the ratings showed Venables to be – statistically speaking – the fourth-best defensive coordinator in the country during that time frame, behind Kirby Smart (Bama), Bud Foster (Va. Tech) and Randy Shannon (Miami, Fla.). If you take out non-active coaches, he would be third-best. Granted, Smart hasn’t been defensive coordinator at Alabama for the past decade – just four years – but his and head coach Nick Saban’s defenses have been statistically the best.

COACH NAME CURRENT TEAM YRS. RATING

1 Kirby Smart Alabama 4 93.89

2 Bud Foster Virginia Tech 11 92.12

3 Brent Venables Clemson 11 89.61

4 Mike Stoops Oklahoma 3 87.19

5 John Chavis LSU 11 84.37

Of course, football is a sport of ‘what have you done for me lately’ so I narrowed it down to the last three years, and Venables still cracks the top ten.

COACH NAME CURRENT TEAM YRS. RATING

1 Kirby Smart Alabama 3 94.44

2 John Chavis LSU 3 89.04

3 Luke Fickell Ohio St. 1 83.04

4 Pete Kwiatkowski Boise St. 2 82.83

5 Greg Mattison Michigan 1 82.54

6 Bud Foster Virginia Tech 3 81.26

7 Brent Venables Clemson 3 79.31

8 Dick Bumpas TCU 3 77.94

9 Gary Patterson TCU 3 77.94

10 Todd Grantham Georgia 2 77.25

Interestingly enough, former Clemson defensive coordinator Kevin SteeleKevin Steele

Defensive Coordinator/Linebackers

View Full Profile ranked 46th-best over the last three seasons, and actually ranked 87th in the nation in the formula a year ago. Venables came in at 26th on the list. Over the last decade, Steele came in at 65th on the list, compared to Venables’ fourth-place spot.

And just in case you were wondering, offensive coordinator Chad Morris comes in at 13th in the offensive coordinator rankings over the last decade, a ranking that takes into account scoring, offense, total offense, third down efficiency and turnovers lost.

COACH NAME CURRENT TEAM YRS. RATING

1 Todd Monken Oklahoma St. 1 493.92

2 Pep Hamilton Stanford 1 490.67

3 Chip Kelly Oregon 5 488.73

4 Mike Leach Washington St. 7 388.07

5 Dana Holgorsen West Virginia 6 385.05

6 Greg Davis Iowa 10 384.84

7 Jarrett Anderson TCU 3 482.46

8 Josh Heupel Oklahoma 1 382.04

9 Kliff Kingsbury Texas A&M 2 481.73

10 Bryan Harsin Texas 6 380.12

11 Ed Warinner Ohio St. 3 377.65

12 Kennedy Pola Southern California 2 377.33

13 Chad Morris Clemson 2 376.98

The head coach rankings take into account winning percentage, strength of schedule rank, average scoring offense, average scoring defense, turnover margin and penalties. Head coach Dabo Swinney ranks 32nd on the list based on those criteria. If you just do the rankings since 2009 – his first full year as head coach – he comes in at 25th.

So, if you are also a numbers person, you can go to the website, customize it by year, by active or non-active coaches or by a particular timeframe. There are also a ton of other statistical categories you can look at in the drop-down box, from FCS coaches to how coaches do against the spread to graduation rates.